Upbringing and family
A journey through the life of Borgny Tingstedt...
I was born by caesarean section at Lunds BB (the maternity ward) on Tuesday 29 November 1955. At the time, we lived in a small community called Liatorp in Småland in central Sweden.
My father's name was Allan and he was born in 1921. He worked as a railway employee and worked hard in our garden.
My mother Maj-Britt, who was born in 1922, was a housewife, and she was partially disabled after a combination of "English disease" or rickets, which is due to insufficient mineralization of the growing skeleton, as a result of too low an intake of calcium, vitamin D or too little exposure to sunlight, and "Spanish flu" which was an unusually severe and deadly form of influenza that spread throughout the world at the end of and just after the First World War.
Around 500 million were infected and between 50 and 100 million died, corresponding to 3-6% of the world's population at the time. Most of the victims were young adults and children, who were otherwise in good health. This had made my mother round-shouldered and short.
At first, we lived in an apartment but later moved to a smaller, newly built villa. I grew up with both a cat and a dog, but never had any siblings. I don't have many memories of these early years, but I remember my friend Annelie and some ski trips with my mother. I was often sick when I was younger: suffered from bronchitis and had pneumonia with a high fever a few times.
Pics from the years in Liatorp
Life in Nässjö - growing up and school!
Moving to another town
Shy and insecure
In 1960, there were changes at my father's workplace, and we had to move to Nässjö, which was my mother's hometown, and there he could continue his work as a railway employee.
My father often had extra work where he worked as a farmhand for some shops, handed out advertisements and picked berries and sold them, and his income eventually sufficed for both a summer cottage, a car and trips abroad.
After living in a smaller apartment at first, we then moved to a three-room apartment in central Nässjö, where I got my own room when I became a little older. But there were never any siblings or more pets in the Tingstedt family.
Few friends - summer cottage
Summer holidays
I had a hard time making friends at school, and was bullied mostly throughout my primary school years because I was a bit overweight, shy, clumsy, bad at sports and a swot.
I had a few friends growing up and never attended school parties or private birthday celebrations.
I was good at most subjects, but especially in science, mathematics and languages.
We had a summer cottage in Bäckseda outside Vetlanda where we spent our summer holidays for about ten years. There we were close to relatives and their children. I spent a lot of time with Eva-Lena and Pia during the summers. We went swimming, played with toy boats, shot bows and arrows and built huts in the forest there. It was close to nature, lakes and small rivers.
School & new hobbies
Discovers music for real...
Our first charter trip abroad for the family was to Mallorca in 1968, and we returned there in 1971.
After primary school, I started a four-year technical high school in 1974, electrical engineering branch, in Nässjö, with a special interest in physics and chemistry.
I delved into the world of literature early on and read a lot, there were hundreds of books that were borrowed from the city library.
I got my own room, started listening to a lot of music, got my own aquarium. I had given up playing the piano after taking lessons for a few years.
I then played basketball and handball for a few years and was part of the YMCA basketball team, but didn't make any friends there. I felt mostly left out.
Disaster hits
Northing will be the same...
However, my whole life was turned upside down on April 11, 1973 when my mother passed away after a period of heart problems and having been hospitalized. Before that, she had suffered from depression for a few years.
I had always had a lot of support for my studies at home, and now I lost interest to a large extent in school.
Made some new friends in Thorleif and Märit and they enlightened my first interest in painting and writing.
It was through them i met my first girlfriend Helena Wallenborg. But it was Yvonne Daulin who became my first partner during the years 1973-1976. She was the daughter of a family acquaintance, and we had known each other for several years. We shared an interest in music, cinema and books.
We had some great times, but we also fought a lot.
School, summer cottage and charter trips...
Jobs and relationships before entering the IT world...
1974-1976
Immediately after high school, I started working at LIC in Aneby, a factory that packaged medical supplies. However, I didn't enjoy the job and started looking for something that would better suit my education.
In Aneby I lived with my partner Yvonne in an apartment before we moved back to Nässjö.
In 1976, I got a job at Eldon AB in Nässjö, where I worked with assembling control equipment and switchgear. During my five years there, I also became active in the trade union.
Me and Yvonne loved listening to music, visiting marketplaces and go out dancing.
1976-1981
After breaking up with Yvonne, I met my pen pal Margarita (originally from Venezuela) in Trinidad in the West Indies. We had big plans for the future, but never dared to realize them.
I was quite lonely in the coming years, apart from a few short relationships with Theresa and Marion.
I also started giving courses at Medborgarskolan in psychology, parapsychology and aquariums as a hobby.
In my spare time I worked extra at Waldia Förlag for seven years with reproduction work. For a while, I also published an advertising brochure in Nässjö and surrounding area.
In 1974 I visited Spain and Andorra with Yvonne and in the summer of 1975 I went on a road trip around Europe with Yvonne and Eva-Lena.
In 1979 I traveled alone to Taormina in Sicily, where I met Maggan (a friend from Nässjö) and her friends.
Developing new interests...
Reading books is something I have continued with all my life. At first, it was a lot of Science Fiction and thrillers. Then it have also become a lot of non-fiction and magazines, today most of it in English.
I have also had aquariums for many years. Learned to build my own aquariums, raised fish, published a magazine, was part of an association and held courses.
For a period I collected stamps and coins
TV series and films have always been a nice interest, as well as music, which is something I have a hard time living without.
For many years, I was also interested in parapsychology, ancient mysteries, UFOs (published my own magazine, investigated several cases, was part of serious associations, started data processing already in the late 1970s).
Continuing exploration...
For a while, I competed in shooting, first with air rifles, and later with a Mauser rifle.
I early took a stand against religion, which I considered superstition or maybe visitations by ancient alians.
At work, we formed a group for Bible studies for non-believers and I learned a lot about the history behind today's Christian faith, as we went back to the original texts.
I also tried to learn to paint with oil.
Natural sciences, astronomy, space travel, new technology and computers became and still are my great interests.
I longed to travel a lot and experience new countries and cultures, but the lack of money and travel companions limited the opportunities for many years.
Taking a stand against violence...
I distanced myself from violence and all forms of military defense alreday at an early age.
I was, however, called up for basic military training at I12/Fo17 in Eksjö in 1975, but refused to report. I was then picked up by the police, refused to obey orders on the spot and was sent home again. Because of this, I was sentenced to one month in prison for refusing to bear arms and began serving the sentence at the prison in Skänninge in July 1976, but was pardoned by the government after 2.5 weeks.
Five years later, I was called up again and refused once again in August 1981 to do military service. This time I was sentenced to three months in prison and I began serving my sentence at the Mariestad prison in September 1982, but was released after two months.
Environmental
issues...
I have always been interested in various natural issues and protect the rights of all living beings to their natural habitats and good living conditions.
Today, our civilization is spreading more and more across the planet and one natural area after another is disappearing along with several species annually.
Global warming not only causes changed climate conditions for us humans in the form of storms, raised sea levels, etc., it also changes the chances of survival for many animals, such as polar bears and corals.
But we also poison our oceans, the air and all living things with microplastics, being residues of all plastic we use, and PFAS.
Social issues...
There are many important social issues, such as overpopulation, injustice between races, genders and nations, as well as organized crime, human trafficking, abuse of power, war and conflicts, just to name a few.
In addition, we let economic profits control too much of our world and the pursuit of increased production, consumption and power, results in an unsustainable world where we are already consuming far too much of the planet's resources.
We have thus created a global economic elite that largely controls what we should eat, wear, study, research, develop and how we should live, all to fill the coffers for a few.
Would a world without profits and money really be such a bad alternative?
Knowledge and art
Imagine if we instead could work less and be able to do research and explore just out of pure curiosity to learn more.
To be able to fill our surroundings with beautiful buildings, art, uplifting music, poems and literature etc.
To be able to give ourselves time and opportunity to develop our artistic veins without having to think about whether it provides any income or not.
If we could stop devoting resources and energy to the struggle for power, money, natural resources, which political or religious view is correct etc. That is how a civilization truly develops.
Choosing your drugs...
We humans are suffering from more and more cardiovascular diseases, cancer, environmental diseases, etc.
Ready-made meals prepared with chemicals for long shelf life, cattle and fish raised on unnatural food and pumped full of antibiotics, long transports of unripe fruits and vegetables, pesticides to combat pests and weeds...
All this makes today's food questionable and is probably the cause of many of our allergies, cancers and other problems.
The pharmaceutical industry does not want to cure our diseases and ailments, but wants to see us stuck in a medical dependency for as long as possible. The conditions exist to cure many diseases and slow down aging, but are not as economical...
Questionable food choices...
We humans are suffering from more and more cardiovascular diseases, cancer, environmental diseases, etc.
Ready-made meals prepared with chemicals for long shelf life, cattle and fish raised on unnatural food and pumped full of antibiotics, long transports of unripe fruits and vegetables, pesticides to combat pests and weeds...
All this makes today's food questionable and is probably the cause of many of our allergies, cancers and other problems.
The pharmaceutical industry does not want to cure our diseases and ailments, but wants to see us stuck in a medical dependency for as long as possible. The conditions exist to cure many diseases and slow down aging, but are not as economical...
Resources and suffering...
f we don't care that the meat we eat comes from livestock farming, fish farms or chicken farms, and therefore is not particularly healthy, then perhaps we could consider other factors.
These billions of animals have to live their short lives in disgusting conditions, forced to eat unnatural food and being pumped full of antibiotics. Do we really think we have the right to let them suffer like that?
And is it really okay to overfish our waters to the degree that we do?
In addition, all meat production heavily consumes the earth's resources. The meat farms use a lot of food, which requires large areas and a lot of water to produce.
Areas that on a much smaller scale would be enough to grow vegetables for the entire world's population.
If the majority of the world's population were vegetarians or vegans, we would both be much healthier and would consume much less of Earth's resources. And billions of living beings would be spared suffering!
Girls, girls, girls....
Family and relationships in the 1980s and beyond...
My father's hard life...
My father had always worked hard to provide for the family and meet our needs. It was a hard blow for him when my mother died, and he then became more active in, among other things, the temperance movements (IOGT/NTO).
His parents had both died of cancer in the 1970s, and his brother died in a car accident.
Then on May 25, 1979, a tragic accident occurred at his work at SJ (Statens Järnvägar) and he lost both legs.
It took many operations and a long struggle to get back to life. He learned how to walk with prostheses and got a specially adapted car. The apartment was also adapted to his needs. He then continued to work until the turn of the year 1981/82 and continued to be active in associations, got a girlfriend, etc.
But then in 2001 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, had surgery and received treatment. Everything seemed to have gone well, but a few years later the cancer had returned and had then spread throughout the body. In 2006, the fight ended.
Marion & Theresa
Theresa had a tough marriage behind her, but she had not managed to completely break free from her dominant Greek husband and her mental scars from domestic violence. We had a short relationship during the summer before she was caught in the claws of her ex once more.
Marion and her young son lived in an apartment in the same town as me, and we were together for a couple of months at the end of 1980.
What I didn't know when we broke up, was that she was pregnant, which I learned first a couple of months later, after a miscarriage, when she contacted me.
"Ada"
"Ada" or Lena, which was her real name, was working as a teacher in a small community a couple of hours' drive from where I was living. We met in 1981 and we stayed together for about a year.
She very much wanted a steadfast relationship and was ready to get married. We got us a house in Mullsjö with the help of a loan from my father.
We soon started to argue about many things, and I came to realize she just wanted a man to impregnate her, as she had a history with an abortion she regretted very much.
After a heated argument, she left the evening before the wedding, and ran away to her parents living in another town. Didn't here from here for weeks.
We managed to sell the house, but couldn't even stay friends after this. And I got myself an apartment in Jönköping.
Ann-Louise
In 1982 I answered to a personal from a young woman from Gislaved, a town south of Jönköping.
It as a nice young girl only 16 years old. She lived with her parents and was studying in high school. We had almost two nice years together and had so much fun, spending most weekends together.
However, when I served my second prison sentence for refusing my military service, I suddenly got at letter from her where she broke up with me.
This was in middle of October in 1982. I broke out of jail to see her and hitch-hiked all the way to Gislaved, but never got a chance to see.
But we got back together again, but it all ended in the beginning of 1983 and I was very devestated.
Annelie
Annelie and I met in 1983, when she was living in Gävle and me in an apartment in Jönköping, where she later moved to.
I worked at Stifab AB as a ventilation system designer. After a period of unemployment, we moved down to Malmö in the spring of 1985, where we both got new employments.
Annelie loved literature and animals. That's why she had plenty of cats, birds and aquarium fish as pets.
She suffered, however, from fibromyalgia, which limited her life a lot; living with pain was not easy.
After six years in Malmö, I got a new job in Stockholm (1991) and we found a villa, north of the capitol, in Bålsta, which was in quite a big need of renovation.
We managed to do some interesting travels abroad during the years we were together;
- Cyprus,
- A tour of Egypt
- A big round trip to Malaysia, Borneo and Brunei,
- Visited Thailand and Burma.
But things didn't work so well between us after a while, so in 1996 we went our separate ways.
Irina, my wife...
On August 21, 1998, life changed. On a flight to Saint Petersburg, I met Irina. The engagement and wedding were soon approaching, but the wait for a residence permit for Irina and her then 7-year-old daughter Olga was tiring.
Irina was an educated psychologist, but had to complete some studies before she could receive her Swedish license to practise.
The following years became a mix of work, studies, trips abroad and renovating the villa from floor to ceiling.
Irina has a broad artistic vein: she plays the guitar and piano, paints in watercolor and alcoholic ink, performs improvisational theater, etc,
She enjoys nature with hikes and kayaking, as well as a relaxing TV series from the couch.
After working in both Bålsta and Enköping, she finally landed in Stockholm, where she works with Internet treatment and she is responsible for planning education for psychologists in Region Stockholm.
Unreliable communications and more activities there meant that the family bought an apartment in Henriksdal, and now she commutes to and from Bålsta on a weekly basis.
Adoptive daughter...
Olga learned Swedish and English very quickly after she had moved to Sweden and found the Swedish school to be easy.
She had few friends growing up and participated in renovation and gardening work at home, played tennis for a few years with the family.
After studying at Sigtuna Läroverket and Uppsala University, it was time to do an internship as a doctor and she did it in Norway where she then settled and still lives.
Today she works as a psychiatrist at a hospital in a small town there. She loves nature and long hikes in the mountains and countryside, all seasons, with or without company.
She also plays piano, flute and guitar, dances Lindy-hop, enjoys painting and has had cats as pets for several years.
She is vegan and cares about nature and all living things.
Working on the house...
Our villa was built in the early 1970s and many years of work have been spent renovating and adapting it to our needs.
We have done most of the work ourselves, with the exception of plumbing and replacing the roof and windows. New bathrooms, new kitchen, sauna, laundry room, new floors, new roofs, tearing down walls, wall cladding, etc.
Today, most of it is as we want it, but nothing lasts forever and, of course, it requires constant maintenance.
Outdoors we put up a new veranda, storage room, cultivations of rhubarb, currants, gooseberries and strawberries, flower beds, a huge cherry tree, several apple trees, as well as lawns and walkways.
Therefore, in the summer there are many things to take care of. And a multitude of animals thrive in our lush garden, everything from small birds and squirrels to deers and cats.
In the winter, shoveling snow, to be able to drive the car in and out, provides extra exercise.
New interests...
In the late 2010s I started dancing Zumba and other group fitness dances such as Sh'bam, Love2dance, Street Jam etc. In 2019 I discovered Salsation which I dance both locally, online and at various events worldwide, usually 3-5 times a week, along with almost daily yoga.
In 2008-2009 I took a writing course at "Winghill Writing School". My work assignment there turned into a trilogy of thick novels. Today I have published seven books in English and three in Swedish, and I'm still working on more.
I have also discovered the possibility of creating songs with the help of AI and have just started publishing on Spotify, YouTube, Apple music and other places.
I am still involved in environmental and social issues, and right now, research into our future with AI are highly topical topics that engage me. It is both a fascinating and scary future that awaits around the corner, and the development is going frighteningly fast.
There will still be hikes in nature, partly up north here in Sweden when the autumn colors are golden, but also in connection with our trips abroad.
I am still a vegetarian, and often I also try to be vegan.
Travels...
There have been many trips around the world, the first years together with Irina it was often to Russia, exploring the richness of culture and art.
We have also visited "Stora Karlsö" on Swedish east coast with its bird colonies several times, as well as the training resort Playitas on Fuerteventura.
But there have been trips around Europe, to India, the Maldives, the Galapagos, Iceland, Cuba, Greenland and other places.
But there are still many destinations that loom:
Japan
Australia
New Zealand
South America
China
Korea
Bali
etc.
